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Caul
Jack "Caul" Bentham is one of Miss Peregrine's brothers, and the primary antagonist of the series. Biography According to the third novel Library of Souls, Jack 'Caul' Bentham is siblings with Miss Peregrine and Myron Bentham. Born male, he did not inherit the time controlling ability Miss Peregrine has. Jealous of his sister's power and privileges, Caul would bully his infant sister just for the fun of it and grew up to hate and despise her and ymbrynes in general. As he grew, he became obsessed with the legends of Abaton and the Library of Souls which supposedly houses the souls and abilities of deceased peculiars. Rallying misguided and dissatisfied peculiar youths, most of whom are male, he started a political movement meant to overthrow the ymbrynes as the rightful leaders of peculiardom, promising to lead the peculiars to enslave humanity and rule the world like how it was eons ago when peculiar giants were the dominant creatures. In reality, however, Caul only wanted to install himself as the leader of peculiardom and reshape the world in his image, with his followers being nothing more than cannon fodder and his brother Myron imprisoned when the latter started to question his motives. When Myron realised how dangerous Caul had become, he purposely spread rumors on how to manipulate loops into granting permanent longevity when it was, in fact, an 'arcane and largely forgotten procedure to collapse loops, quickly and permanently, in an emergency'. Falling for the trap, Caul and his followers performed the infamous and controversial experiment in a Siberia loop, which ended devastatingly and turned them into hollowgasts. At some time before the setting of Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children, Caul managed to feed on enough peculiars and evolved into a wight. He began leading his former followers once more to destroy the ymbrynes and gain access to the Library of Souls, this time with guns to replace the powers his wights had lost. He sent the wight Golan and the latter's hollowgast Malthus to eliminate the famed Hollowgast-slayer Abraham Portman and kidnap Miss Peregrine and Miss Avocet, thus laying the setting for the first novel. Miss Peregrine's Home for Peculiar Children Caul first appears in his bird form nearing the end of the first novel, stuck in a floating birdcage in the sea. He was released there by the wights in a U-boat after they managed to capture Miss Avocet and the real Miss Peregrine in order to keep tabs on the peculiar children. He was soon 'rescued' by Emma and tagged along with the children in her canoe away from Cairnholm under the identity of Miss Peregrine. Hollow City Still spying on the unaware peculiar children, Caul remained in his peregrine form through the journey to Miss Wren's London loop while faking his inability to transform back into 'human' form. In this installment, Caul plays the passive role of monitoring the children's progress without directly aiding or sabotaging their escape from the wights. Uncharacteristically of Ms Peregrine, he killed Winnifred the pigeon in the St. Paul's Cathedral loop, and it is unknown if he wanted to fake Miss Peregrine losing her humanity, silence the pigeon before its nervous behavior roused suspicion or just wanted to kill it. His identity is revealed at the end of the novel when he transformed back into a wight in Miss Wren's hideout of his own will, revealing to the peculiars and ymbryne that he had been stalking them all the while, even capturing the Menagerie and placing the ice fort under siege with his wights. He then initiated a scuffle and tried to take Althea as a hostage, only to stab her with an icicle when she tried to freeze him. With her dead, the ice began to melt away, allowing Caul's wights to storm the fort, capturing all the peculiars and Miss Wren. He then brought his captives to modern day London before escorting them back to his hideout, the Devil's Acre, thus ending the second novel. Library of Souls Having brought his captives to the Devil's Acre, he managed to threaten the ymbrynes to unlock the door to Abaton, only to realize he needed a special peculiar, a Librarian, to see and manipulate soul jars to grant Caul its abilities. Anticipating Jacob and Emma's plans to rescue the rest of the peculiars and ymbrynes, Caul set a trap to injure, if not incapacitate them with a swarm of hollowgasts, only for Jacob to control all of them to turn the tide against the wights. Apparently defeated, Caul managed to escape and convince an exasperated Myron to capture Miss Peregrine with his grimbear, taking advantage of an ash storm. Taking Miss Peregrine hostage, Caul entered the Library of Souls where soul jars of ancient peculiars are stored. After having Jacob to empty a soul jar into the spirit pool, Caul shot him in the chest so no one else, especially his brother, could gain power from other soul jars, leaving him as the only peculiar giant alive. Unknown to him, Myron ingested the peculiar soul of Abraham Portman, also a Librarian, and absorbed the soul of another great ancient peculiar while Caul was busy trying to have his revenge against his sister, Miss Peregrine. In the ensuing battle between Caul and Myron, the ymbrynes attempted to collapse the Abaton loop while Caul was distracted, resulting in the loop closing with Caul (and Myron) still stuck inside, leaving him presumably trapped forever, if not dead. A Map of Days Caul apears in Jacob's nightmare telling him that he has "big , big plans" for him. The Conference of the Birds Caul appears several times throughout the novel via dreams, and on one occassion, through a corpse. He is later resurrected by a group of liberated wights. Graphic Novel In the first graphic novel, Caul takes the form of a peregrine falcon and trick Emma and Jake into rescuing him. For most of the Hollow City graphic novel, Caul is impersonating his sister, doing cruel things that she never would do, like killing the peculiar pigeon Winnifred. Miss Wren later has him change back into his true form, when he breaks the news about his men visiting the menagerie. When Althea brings him the pants he requested, he takes hold of her hair and threatens to drive an icicle "into her jugular". When she escapes and starts freezing him, he takes a hold of the dropped icicle and kills her. He then has the peculiar children and Miss Wren taken by his wights. Description Nearing the end of Hollow City, Caul is described as a stunted little man with knobby knees and a balding head and a nose like a used pencil eraser right after his transformation from a peregrine into a wight. Like other wights, Caul looks like an ordinary human with pure white eyes. However, he has a 'weird pair of knobby protrusions' near his shoulder blades, a telltale sign that he can shape-shift into a bird. Otherwise, he does not appear to be much different from any other wight. In his peregrine form, he looks exactly like Miss Peregrine in bird form, complete with black peregrine eyes. In a picture in chapter four of Library of Souls, Caul was shown to have hair before he turned into a wight, while he was described to be balding in Hollow City (as mentioned above). This could mean that while wights and hollowgasts are essentially immortal, they could still lose their hair naturally, especially when they were balding when the Experiment took place. Note that the picture of Caul and Myron was taken before their relationship soured, perhaps years or even decades before the Experiment took place. By then Caul's physical condition may have worsened by then, enough for him to start balding. Personality Like most villains Caul is emotionless, megalomaniac and sadistic, showing emotions only when it benefits him. Myron Bentham claims that the little humanity he had left seemed to dissapear when he became a Wight. Despite the many loyal followers he has, Caul only cares for himself as shown in the end of library of souls when he betrayed his own brother. Caul is quite sexist as well. He believes that a man should be ruling peculiardom rather than women. He also directly disregards Emma when she is speaking, calling her a "girl" who shouldn't chime in while he and Jacob, who he refers to as "the males", were conversing. Peculiarity Although a wight, Caul does have a peculiarity: shape-shifting. Being the brother of Miss Peregrine, he shares the same ability to turn into a peregrine without the aid of ambrosia or external spells. Due to his gender, however, he is not a true ymbryne and cannot manipulate time to maintain loops. However, his shape-shifting peculiarity proves useful in allowing him to deceive the peculiar children into thinking he was Miss Peregrine, thus gaining knowledge of the whereabouts of the Menagerie and Miss Wren's loop in London. Relationships Myron Bentham Caul sees his younger brother as lesser than him despite being close in young adulthood. Caul has frequently harmed his brother including breaking his legs beyong repair. When it came to taking on powerful peculiar souls together, Caul said that Myron was too weak to do so, but admits Myron is more intelligent. When Myron begs him, this only seems to confirm Caul's point. In the end, the brothers fight to their death in Abaton. Alma Lefay Peregrine Caul has been physically violent with his sister since childhood including pinching her as a baby and plucking out her feathers in bird form. He believes that she thinks herself superior to everyone else and hates the influence ymbrynes have. As adults, Caul takes great joy in tormenting Miss Peregrine and her wards. He claims that his lack of experimenting on her compared to the other ymbrynes was due to wanting to save the best for last. He shows no remorse in threatening her life repeatedly or causing her physical and emotional harm such as flinging her against a wall or shooting Jacob in front of her. As Abaton collapses, he screams her name in anger. Trivia * In his peregrine falcon form, Caul is the only wight to have eyes with black pupils. * He is also the only wight to retain his peculiarity. This might be due to bird shape-shifting being a special ability, capable of resisting the effects of the experiment. * Despite the experiment, Caul is able to regain his memory after being turned into a wight, reinstating himself as the leader. Category:Characters Category:Wights Category:Males Category:Peculiars Category:Antagonists Category:Adults Category:Deceased Category:Characters with shape shifting ability Category:Hollow City Category:Library of Souls Category:The Conference of the Birds